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A bizarre skeleton from a Roman grave has bones from eight people

Radiocarbon dating and DNA analysis have revealed that a complete skeleton found in a 2nd-century cemetery is made up of bones from many people spanning thousands of years – but we don’t know who assembled it or why




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Carbon emissions from private jets have exploded in recent years

The climate impact of flights taken by the super-rich rose sharply from 2019 to 2023, fuelling calls for a carbon tax on private aviation




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We are a long way from pregnancy being safe on Mars

Dangerous radiation reaches Mars at levels we aren't exposed to on Earth, which makes the Red Planet a particularly dangerous place to be during pregnancy




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21 Terrific Tweets by Cat Pawrents Benefitting From the Bond With Their Fluffy Feline Friend

Hello all you cat pawrents, how are you doing this Caturday? Do you want to tell us about your cat child? Do you wish you could chit-chat about your fluffy feline friend all day long? Do you think any other humble hooman would want to hear about your kitty cat? If you answered "Yes" to the first two questions - know that you are very much not alone. A lot, and we mean a lot of cat pawrents just wait for an opportunity to talk about their beloved cat children. And if you've wondered about the answer to the third question - it's always a loud, resounding, meowing "Yes". There will always be cat pawrents who want to hear everything about other pawrents' cats, because cats are ameowzing.

Some cat pawrents do it all the time - they tweet a lot about their lovely cats like the true feline fanatic fans they are - and it's a delight for every one of us to read about their experiences and adventures. Here are a few of the funniest, for your cat-filled viewing pleasure.




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Celebrate Caturday in Style with 26 Moments from the Magical Life of Panko the Chonky Cat Child and All Her Hilarious Feline Friends

Spending Cautrday with a cat, let alone a clouder of cats is a truly special experience. There is almost a slight sense of religion to it in how regimented and celebratory the day is. There are specific feeding times for different kinds of treats, each one representing a different feline quality that we love and cherish. There are specific zoomie times that must be observed and much to our dismay there are the clawminal times that must be observed and not interfered with. So if you are spending your Caturday with cats, or simply want to see what it would be like we made this list to help you celebrate Caturday in style with marvelous moments from the magical life of Panko the chonky cat and all her hilarious feline friends.

From the cute kitten whose favorite part of Caturday is the fish smoothie feeding, to the clawminal catto who is all about the chaos of Caturday, to the flabbergasted feline who cannot believe that treat time is over and that he missed it due to indulging in too many zoomies.




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24 SuPURRemely Expressive Cat Memes Mirroring the Hooman Experience From the Feline Pawspective

Cats aren't so different from us. When it's cold outside and we want to avoid responsibilities, we seek our coziest nap spot. When we're hungry at 2 AM, we bother someone for a snack. And when we're pawsitively peeved with the world, it's off to our favorite cat tower to stare down at the peasants below. 

Hooman cat lovers have a funny way of mirroring our experiences with our cats. If you're anything like me, a theatrical cat owner, you know that each cat you encounter has a different voice, different mannerisms, and a totally different pawsonality based on their sass levels. It's only natural to project our fancies on our felines because they're not only our best buds but our purrtner in crime! So if you love your kitty and miss them every day while you're out running errands, working (ew), or socializing with friends, remember that they're silently judging you from afar, waiting for their favorite bald, bipedal giant to come pop open a new can of wet food for them. You are so cherished!

 Pawsitive Vibes: Subscribe to our weekly newsletter for the purrfect Caturday treat!




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Black Cat Starts Mysteriously Losing Its Color, Other Vexed Void Owners Question When Their Cute Cats Go From Midnight to Moonlight

We may or may not be a helicopter cat pawrent - meaning that we may or may not go to Google for every pawssible thing that might be wrong with our cats. Their meow sounds a little different than normal? Google. They all of a sudden start sleeping in a random spot we've never seen them sleep in before? Google. They didn't eat the food that they normally love? Google. Most of the things we google end up being purrfectly fine (we are not prone to overreaction, not one bit). But if our black cat started losing its beautiful black color, now that would be a thing to google!

There are a few pawssible explanations for this: the first is a meowgnificent genetic trait called "vitiligo" - which causes cats to lose pigment in their fur, giving them unique and rare fur patterns. Another option is called a "fever coat", which is a temporary change in a cat's fur pigment due to illness or stress. The last, and final option that we know of, is that this black beauty is just getting old. Either way, you'd be surprised how many vexed void owners chimed in with their black cats that went from midnight to moonlight. Scroll down to see all these fading felines below!




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K Manga Adds 'I Don't Want to Be Killed By You, My Crown Prince!', My Reveal Skill is OP! -Taking from Legendary Heroes to Become the Strongest Manga

Also: The Great Queen Victoria Winner Ostwen Has Arrived! launches in English




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Crunchyroll Streams Clip from Overlord: The Sacred Kingdom Anime Film

Crunchyroll began screening film in North America on November 8




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HIDIVE to Stream From Bureaucrat to Villainess: Dad's Been Reincarnated!, Beheneko: The Elf-Girl's Cat is Secretly an S-Ranked Monster! Anime

Both anime screen N. American premieres at Anime Frontier on December 7




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A Totally Original Parable Not Derived From Anything Else Really

Once upon a time a man named Barry Goldwater appeared on the political scene. And the radical cried, “Danger! A fascist!” And the people came running, but they saw that, actually, he was just a right-wing authoritarian, and he was making no effort to build a mass movement based on violence and terror in order … Continue reading A Totally Original Parable Not Derived From Anything Else Really




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Lady Whiskerdown’s Letters from the Cat Cafe

This piece of literary mayhem is exclusive to Smart Bitches After Dark, but fret not. If you'd like to join, we'd love to have you! Have a look at our membership options, and come join the fun! If you want to have a little extra fun, be a little more yourself, and be part of keeping the site open for everyone in the future, we can’t wait to see you in our new subscription-based section … Continue reading Lady Whiskerdown’s Letters from the Cat Cafe




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Mother bans adult daughter from family Thanksgiving after she refuses to host the event: 'I made it very clear she needed to stay true to her word and if she dumped it on someone else she wouldn't be going to Thanksgiving'

Hosting events is a lot of work; there's a house to be cleaned, food to be prepped, and a lot of general setup that needs to be taken care of. When it's family, it's even more so to do—it's probably a good idea to hide the things your family won't approve of and save yourself the judgment.

Family hosting schedules help to ease the burden of any one person having to host too often, and the reality is that for a member of the family to drop from hosting duties places a disproportionate amount of responsibility on the other members of the family to host additional events.

The problem is this assumes that each member of the family is equally able to host in the first place. The reality is this is never the case. Some people, usually older members of the family, have homes with more space for hosting more people and the space to store the things necessary for hosting a large family. Many of us, particularly in our younger adult years, live in spaces that we'd be horrified to let our family into.




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'It was nonsense': Entitled employee constantly takes credit for other's work, coworker gets revenge by making a fake presentation for her to present in front of boss

There's always that one coworker who knows how to get away with taking credit for everyone else's hard work. You put in the effort, lose sleep over the details, and then they swoop in, ready to present it all like they thought of it themselves. This exact situation happened in one office until one clever employee decided to turn the tables. After watching his entitled coworker repeatedly swipe his projects and pass them off as her own, he put together a presentation just for her. Packed with confusing data points and meaningless buzzwords, the presentation was just convincing enough to look important…until you actually tried to explain it. And sure enough, the coworker snagged it and confidently presented it in front of their boss. The employee watched with quiet satisfaction as she stumbled through, each buzzword making less sense than the last. When the boss turned to him for clarification, he threw her under the bus, telling the boss she had no idea what she was talking about. Sweet, sweet office justice.




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‘So I ruined him’: Landlord neighbor siphons water from man's water supply for over a year so the man cleverly cuts off the supply, resulting in tenant complaints and a hefty fine

Moving to a new place has its pros and cons. You might've caught a good deal on a nice home and are looking for a change of scenery. Most of the time, everything seems perfect on paper until you actually get to your new neighborhood. Once you settle into your humble abode, you start noticing some strange, not-so-coincidental things going on.

Aside from the one-off neighbors parking their bikes in front of your gate, you might notice that your water pressure isn't up to par. You think that, maybe, you might need to call a plumber to get the issue looked at so it doesn't get worse. The thing about observant people is that they really see things for what they are. The homeowner in this story realizes soon enough that his neighbor, who is a landlord to two tenants, has been hooked up to his water supply for who knows how long.

The man's water pressure would only work well when he noticed his neighbors were not using water, and he waited a while before he made real accusations. When he was sure his suspicions were correct, he cuts of the supply, which leads to a chain reaction of issues at his next-door neighbor's building, including: no water, ruining of electrical wiring, and some very angry tenants.




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'My dad’s beautiful brain started thinking': Karen neighbor insists HOA remove neighbor's boat from view, neighbor maliciously complies with her demands

Minding your business? This woman has never heard of such a thing. She's being a rather nosy neighbor, as u/Ok-One-3240 shared in their family's story of malicious compliance

Some people just can't help being busybodies. They have too much time on their hands, and they're going to make it everyone else's problem, too. This person shares that their family enjoyed living in a gated community, and they spent a good amount of time using their boat. Each weekend, they'd take the boat out for a few days, then store it again for the rest of the week. As long as the boat wasn't within view of the street, their local HOA had no problem with it. That's a common issue that people seem to have with their HOAs… who cares if you can see someone's boat? It's a pretty frivolous rule in the first place, and this person mentions that their HOA didn't really enforce the rule too strongly.

Then along comes this busybody neighbor who decides to make it her mission to bug the boat family. Read the whole dramatic story below. 

Up next, read about what happened when this 17-year-old babysat her aunt's kids and helped herself to a piece of cake… from a dessert that cost $90! 




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'His hand pauses in midair': Front desk attendant gets scolded for using his phone at work, instead he maliciously complies with company policy by wasting other precious office resources

No personal cell phones? Okay. This employee took his malicious compliance to the next level after getting scolded one too many times for using his cell phone on the job. 

I get it… It doesn't look good for a hotel receptionist to scroll memes while the line at the concierge starts to grow. Smacking your gum, rolling your eyes, and scrolling endlessly really isn't something you're supposed to be doing at work, but as many of us forget, our phones are actually super useful little tools. We've grown accustomed to traveling around all day with a tiny computer in our pocket that it's easy to let slip their more convenient functions. The front desk reception guy in our next tale knew all the ways his phone could help out clients, but after his manager got on his back about using his personal device on the clock, he decided to use the second language translating tool at his disposal. 

Keep scrolling to read how an employee turned a spiteful MC into a memorable guest experience when a traveler needed help with a quick translation.




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Candidate gets rejected from a job they perfectly qualify for, they reapply with a new email account and immediately get moved up in the hiring process: ‘It was even the same recruiter’

Who didn't experience the frustration of getting email after email of rejection from countless jobs you thought you'd be perfect for? If you never experienced that, then congratulations! You are one in a million. If you do know what we're talking about, our question to you is – After how many rejections did you acknowledge that maybe the problem is you and something should change? 50? 100? 1000?  Plus, what does one should change to actually make a difference?

The person in this Reddit story came up with an interesting tactic after getting rejected from a job for which they were perfectly qualified. After several more similar rejections that made no sense to OP (original poster), they decided to open a new email account and reapply for jobs using the same exact resume. This tactic proved successful when they were immediately moved up to the next step in the hiring process for that initial perfect job.

Keep scrolling to read the full story. After you are done, click here for a story of an employee who overheard their boss talking about major workplace changes, and then confronted him about it.




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High school English teacher docks 99 points from a student's grade by cleverly proving they used AI to write their assignment: ‘We both knew what they did’

It seems like the only way to prevent cheating in an age where we all have little computers in our pockets is to completely isolate a person, give them a pencil and some paper, and unleash their class assignment. But since we don't exist in a vacuum and high school classes have upwards of 30+ kids per 45-minute class period, you've got to be like this teacher in our next story, who was far more clever than that. 

Being a teacher in 2024 is probably one of the most challenging jobs. 

Teachers are overworked, under-appreciated, and likely underpaid for their version of professional cat-wrangling. Not only are the kids feral, but they're becoming far more witty to cut corners in class. However, wiley, lazy, and arrogant teenagers make the perfect target for a well-laid trap in the form of a hyper-specific creative writing assignment. 

Keep scrolling to read the satisfying tale of a cheater getting exposed for their lies and thrown to the wolves simply because they were too entitled to attempt their school assignment.




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Stepmother admonishes 16-year-old for taking her necklace away from 1-year-old sister, leading to public meltdown: 'She started lecturing me'

Learning boundaries is important, even if it means being disappointed—not everything is always going to go your way. Sure, when you're one year old, something you were interested in suddenly disappearing might be the worst thing that's ever happened to you, but it's important to learn that lesson now because once you're older, learning that same lesson gets a lot more inappropriate and embarrassing. There's a big difference between a 12-year-old throwing a public tantrum because they didn't get what they wanted and a one-year-old crying for the same reason.

With parenting, there's a delicate balance to be struck between giving kids the best childhood possible and making sure they learn the right lessons. One day, that kid is going to be an adult. Never being disappointed by anything during their development as a kid is going to lead to them becoming a spoilt teen and then a full-grown, entitled person. And at some point, it's going to be too late to set them on the right path without serious self-evaluation. 

As commenters have noted here, the teen is the real parent in this situation… and the stepmother's response hints at a possibly unnecessarily hostile attitude toward her stepdaughter.




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'I am not allowed to do anything': Retail worker faces down angry parents after colleague sells parents the wrong computer for kid's gaming ambitions, prevented from helping them by silly company policy

Working retail is a hectic and endless stream of customer interactions that balance on a knife's edge, with any one of them threatening to teeter off into a full-blown customer meltdown with possibly little to no cause. It's a way of living that leaves you emotionally drained and completely exasperated, while weekends end up giving you just enough time to self-isolate and prepare for your next shift.

Meanwhile, despite claiming to have the customer's best interest at heart, upper management makes decisions that only serve to maximize their own bonuses and profit, putting you directly in the firing line for even more hostile interactions with customers. They'll enact some broad-sweeping policy that flies in the face of logical reason and expect you to follow it to the letter, vaguely implying serious consequences should you not blindly obey and refuse to listen to the insistence of everyone that their plan is a bad one. Then, acting like it's the worker's fault when they receive customer complaints about their policy. That's what this retail worker shared experiencing when they recounted this story from their days in retail, facing down belligerent customers whilst handling bizarre directives from their superiors.




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Happy Friday from Marlowe and Her Dad

Have a wonderful weekend, friends.




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Cartoons from the June 26, 2023, Issue


Cartoons from the June 26, 2023, Issue




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Cartoons from the July 3, 2023, Issue


Cartoons from the July 3, 2023, Issue




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Cartoons from the July 24, 2023, Issue


Cartoons from the July 24, 2023, Issue




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Cartoons from the July 31, 2023, Issue


Cartoons from the July 31, 2023, Issue




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Cartoons from the August 7, 2023, Issue


Cartoons from the August 7, 2023, Issue




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Cartoons from the August 14, 2023, Issue


Cartoons from the August 14, 2023, Issue




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Cartoons from the August 21, 2023, Issue


Cartoons from the August 21, 2023, Issue




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Cartoons from the August 28, 2023, Issue


Cartoons from the August 28, 2023, Issue




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Cartoons from the September 4, 2023, Issue


Cartoons from the September 4, 2023, Issue




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Blast (?) from the past

Comics Curmudgeon readers! Do you love this blog and yearn for a novel written by its creator? Well, good news: Josh Fruhlinger's The Enthusiast is that novel! It's even about newspaper comic strips, partly. Check it out! Barney Google and Snuffy Smith, 11/12/24 As we move inexorably into a post-newspaper world, we do have to […]




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From Wimbledon to VAR, is tech hurting the drama of sport?

As Wimbledon scraps human line judges, sport insiders suggest how we can make games more exciting.




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Five tips for turning gaming from a hobby to a job

Gaming: Five tips for turning your hobby into a job




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How X users can earn thousands from US election misinformation and AI images

The accounts are part of pro-Trump and pro-Harris networks sharing each other’s content multiple times a day.




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What Elon Musk could gain from Trump's presidency

One of the president-elect's most visible supporters, Musk could be given a role in Trump's White House.




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NatWest blocks staff from using WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger

Employees must stick to official channels to make sure their messages are fully retrievable.




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Seven wild moments from the turbulent story of Bitcoin

Its record price is making headlines - but that's just one part of the cryptocurrency's tumultuous story.




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TikTok profits from livestreams of families begging

Children are among those pleading for hours for digital gifts, as the company takes a cut of up to 70%.




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More from the BBC on London 2012




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Jamie Oliver pulls 'offensive' children's book from sale

The 400-page fantasy novel is accused of stereotyping Indigenous Australians.




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Mexico drug tsar's spectacular fall from grace culminates in NY court

Genaro García Luna is the highest-ranking Mexican official ever to be convicted in the US.




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Tax-News.com: Putin Signs Law To Withdraw From Dutch DTA

Russia's President Vladimir Putin has signed a law to terminate the country's double tax agreement with the Netherlands.




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Tax-News.com: Netherlands To Restrict Excessive Borrowing From Own Companies

The Dutch Government has submitted a bill to parliament that will restrict the amount that shareholders can borrow from their own companies without the imposition of tax.




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Tax-News.com: Netherlands Allows More Time To Pay Frozen Tax Debts

The Dutch Government has announced that businesses may further delay payment of certain tax dues that were frozen in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.




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Tax-News.com: Netherlands, Germany Extend COVID-19 Frontier Worker Tax Deal

Germany and the Netherlands have agreed to extend the validity of an agreement clarifying the tax arrangements of frontier workers during the COVID-19 pandemic until December 31, 2020.




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India Nature Watch - A play of the light and clouds over the Himalyaan ranges - from Kedarnath peaks to Chaukhambha and beyond

Shot from village Timila in Ranikhet Tehsil of Uttarakhand




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Tax-News.com: Austria And Italy Sign Frontier Worker Tax Agreement

Austria and Italy have signed an agreement clarifying the tax rules for frontier workers who are working at home due to the COVID-19 pandemic.




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Tax-News.com: Switzerland, Italy Agree Tax Deal For Frontier Workers

On December 23, 2020, Switzerland and Italy signed a new agreement on the taxation of cross-border commuters and an amendment to their existing double taxation agreement.




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Tax-News.com: France Publishes List Of Territories Exempt From CbC Local Filing

On July 20, 2020, the French Government published in the Official Gazette a decree to expand the list of jurisdictions exempt from local filing reporting requirements under the country's country-by-country reporting regime.